


The Hero Dies In This One

by gemjam



Category: Formula 1 RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-30
Updated: 2012-06-30
Packaged: 2017-11-08 21:57:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 716
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/447977
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gemjam/pseuds/gemjam
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for flashfic prompt <i>where do we go from here?</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	The Hero Dies In This One

**Author's Note:**

> Post-Brazil 2007.

Lewis stared at the ceiling, breath still coming out ragged and uneven, the sweat coating his body making him feel chilled. He wanted to leave but this was his room and he wasn’t even sure where his underwear was. He shifted slightly, the rustle of sheets sounding far too loud in the strained silence of the room. Out of the corner of his eye he looked at Fernando.

Fernando’s eyes were closed, his breaths coming deep and even. Lewis worried that he might have fallen asleep, that he was going to stay and they’d be stuck with a hideously awkward morning after, but there was something in the way Fernando was holding his body that looked careful and guarded. He wasn’t asleep. Lewis’s second thought was that he was pretending, but he couldn’t work out why that would be. Why would Fernando possibly want to stay here?

With a soft sigh, Lewis flicked his eyes back up to the shadowy ceiling. Of all the ways he expected to spend his night, this wasn’t it. A few hours ago he had the World Championship in his grasp. Now he had nothing but the biggest mistake he’d ever made lying naked on the bed beside him. One point shy, that was all, just one point and it could have been him. He understood now the great distance that stood between winners and losers, and he and Fernando were both losers together.

Lewis wondered if it was really over now, the jealousy and the fighting and the contempt. He hated Fernando, or at least he thought he did, up until about an hour ago. Now he didn’t know what he thought about anything. When Fernando turned up at his hotel room, slightly drunk and clearly looking for a fight, Lewis let him in because he thought that maybe if they beat the shit out of each other, Ron would definitely have to let one of them go next year, and he was confident it would have to be Fernando.

They didn’t beat the shit out of each other though. Destruction comes in many forms and apparently this was the way they were going to tear each other apart.

“You are thinking will be awkward next year?” Fernando asked suddenly.

Lewis turned his head sharply to look at him, seeing that Fernando still had his eyes contentedly shut.

“You won’t be here next year.”

Fernando smiled, slow and unnerving. “We will see.”

“You’re gone, man,” Lewis dismissed. “Ron won’t put up with any more of your bullshit. You nearly ruined his team.”

Fernando opened his eyes, studying Lewis’s face. Lewis had to look away.

“Will you miss me?” Fernando asked.

“Like a hole in the fucking head,” Lewis responded.

“Will you miss this?” Fernando rephrased, reaching out a hand and trailing his fingertips down Lewis’s naked side, making him shiver and flinch away.

“Don’t touch me, man.”

“You did not seem to mind it a moment ago,” Fernando stated coolly.

“I mind now,” Lewis told him. “You need to leave.”

“Your team or your bed?” Fernando asked with a smirk.

“Both,” Lewis insisted.

Fernando gave a shrug, sitting up and reaching for his clothes. As Lewis watched him pull on his McLaren T-shirt he felt a strange kind of regret that he couldn’t identify. It was over now, really over; the season, their time as teammates, every chance they had to turn this around. It might not be official but everyone, Fernando included, knew that his contract at McLaren was going to come to a premature end. Once Fernando was out that door, it was done. Lewis should be relieved, but somehow this felt unfinished.

Fernando turned back to face him, his expression seeming to mirror Lewis’s own thoughts. Where did they go from here? Neither of them knew.

“So now I leave,” Fernando said. Somehow it was neither a question nor a statement, just fractured words that hung there. Lewis didn’t respond. What could he possibly say?

Fernando got to his feet and Lewis looked away. He couldn’t take pleasure in Fernando’s leaving. He wouldn’t take pleasure in his staying either. As he heard the door click shut behind Fernando, he realised this wasn’t an ending at all. It was the beginning of something bigger than both of them.


End file.
